There is a thermal printer including a thermal head in which a plurality of heat generating parts are arranged and formed and a transport mechanism transporting a recording medium to the heat generating parts of the thermal head, and forming an image by transferring the heat generated in each heat generating part to the recording medium such as heat sensitive paper in accordance with a signal input to the thermal head (see, for example, Patent Document 1). The heat generating parts of the thermal head mounted on the thermal printer structured as described above are electrically connected to a conductive pattern, and are supplied with power according to an intended image via the conductive pattern.
However, in the thermal head described above, the heat generated in the heat generating parts is dissipated via the conductive pattern. As a result, in the thermal head described above, sometimes the heat generated in the heat generating parts is not transferred effectively to the recording medium. To transfer the required amount of heat to the recording medium in the thermal head described above, the amount of heat generated in the heat generating parts has to be increased excessively, resulting in a considerable amount of power consumption. Therefore, a thermal head in which the width of a conductive pattern in a plan view near a heat generating part is made narrow compared to other parts in order to prevent dissipation via the conductive pattern has been developed (see, for example, Patent Documents 2 and 3).
Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication JP-A 53-016638 (1978)
Patent Document 2: Japanese Unexamined Utility Model Publication JP-U 54-122728 (1979)
Patent Document 3: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication JP-A 2000-62230